terrible squeaking and squealing. "Ah! the mice—the mice are coming again!" exclaimed Maria, in affright; and she was about to wake her mother, but her voice failed her, and she could stir neither hand nor foot, for she saw the Mouse-King work his way out of a hole in the wall, then run, with sparkling eyes and crowns, around and around the chamber, when, at last, with a desperate leap, he sprang upon the little table that stood close by her bed. "Hi—hi—hi—must give me thy sugar-plums—thy gingerbread—little thing—or I will bite thy Nutcracker—thy Nutcracker!" So squeaked the Mouse-King, and snapped and grated hideously with his teeth, then sprang down again, and away through the hole in the wall. Maria was so distressed by this occurrence that she looked very pale in the morning, and was scarcely able to say a word. A hundred times she was going to inform her mother or Louise of what had happened, or at least to tell Fred, but she
